1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of computing. More specifically, the present invention relates to the resizing of video content within a graphical user interface.
2. Background Information
With advances in integrated circuit, microprocessor, networking and communication technologies, an increasing number of devices, in particular, digital computing devices, are being networked together. Accordingly, content providers who in the past relied on conventional broadcast mediums such as radio and television for media distribution have begun to distribute large amounts of media electronically over the Internet. Whether the media is provided as a file to be downloaded and subsequently rendered through what is referred to as a “viewer” or “player”, or the media is provided as a stream (i.e. where the media begins to be rendered before the entire media clip is retrieved) for near real-time rendering through a player, content providers and player designers are continually trying to improve the user experience associated with digital media distribution and rendering. To that end, although existing players currently provide a rich mix of features to enhance the user experience, additional improvements and features are desirable.
More specifically, existing players limit the ways in which users are able to manipulate the rendered media. For example, in order to resize rendered video content, a user is currently limited to either selecting a predefined percentage to which the image will be scaled (e.g. 50%, 100%, 200% full screen), or resizing the entire player application window containing the rendered video. Unfortunately however, the predefined image sizes do not always provide adequate resizing options or the level of granularity desired by the user, and resizing the entire player application window often results in either the rendered video being obstructed by e.g. the application window, or a large portion of the GUI ending up being devoted to the player application window rather than the video content.